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I think that marketing departments are relying too heavily on their old playbooks, and the game has changed. There seems to be more women hacking perl than there has been in past, (many from design backgrounds) and they are more likely to be insulted than impressed by them. (After all, it is the stereotype they've had to fight to get where they are.)

For technical event, booth babes may not have been the right move anyway. Technical people seem to be much more interested in the hows and whys than other people. Having someone who can't answer their question tends to annoy them. In just about every meeting that I have ever had with an outside vender in which sales, marketing, or other departments have been present, its the members of the technology staff that seem to ask the questions that make the vendor squirm. The vendor and the PowerPoint presentation are just annoyances in the way of the information.

But then, maybe I'm wrong. There are people who study this stuff, and I'd assume they've done their homework. They may have stats that say that booth babes are just as effective in a booth at a technical conference as in a porn convention. And maybe the percentage of men attracted to a booth by and attractive spokesperson is higher than the percentage of women turned off by it. (On the other hand, maybe the fact that I assume that marketing departments decide campaigns based on facts is too engineer-ish.)